The World of Legend
The world of Legend has noticeable parallels with our own in the late 10th century AD, with strong elements of Christian, Greek, Roman, Viking and Arabian mythology. Crusaders of the 'True Faith' (an analogue of Christianity) have defeated the Ta'ashim people (an analogue of Islam) and conquered the Outremer. As the timeline approaches 1000 AD, Millennialist fever grips many.
After emerging victorious from the Battlepits of Krarth (book 1), where a deadly contest is held every thirteen months, you - a hero (or a group of heroes) belonging to the True Faith - are involved in a bloody battle against a pack of werewolves (book 2). Having defeated the pack, you receive a jeweled scabbard from a dying harpist - it's the scabbard of the Sword of Life, dubbed Blood Sword in popular folklore. You will need to find the missing parts of the sword - first the hilt, then the blade - in order to slay the coming True Magi, who were killed in the Blasting - a major cataclysm - six hundred years ago, and now want to rule the world on their return. Only the Blood Sword, the bane of the undead, can stop them. So you travel to the northern land of Wyrd, where the Warlock-King guards the hilt from inside his Palace of Eternal Dusk. Then your journey takes you south (book 3), to Crescentium - the main port of the Outremer. There you will find several allies - among whom the assassin leader Hasan-i-Sabbah - who will help you find the blade. But your old enemy Aiken - a Yamatese warrior, known in the lands of the West by the name of Icon the Ungodly - will eventually find you, and after you defeat him for the second time Icon falls down to Sheol, the realm of the dead, taking the Blood Sword with him. So you will have to enter Sheol (book 4), a patchwork of hells from different mythologies, where a mysterious man who goes by the name of the Traveller takes you through a long journey which ends before archangel Azrael. Here you discover that the Traveller is no one else but Icon, your arch-enemy, whom you finally manage to kill, thus retrieving the Blood Sword. In the last book, while the Millennialist fever is engulfing the continent, you travel north once more to enter the citadel of Spyte, where the True Magi are going to reincarnate at midnight at the end of the millennium. You finally defeat them with the help of Karunaz, a Ta'ashim noble warrior, son of Hasan-i-Sabbah. It's now midnight of Winter's Eve, 999 AD - Judgment Day has come, and you are rewarded with eternal life in Paradise.
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